MANILA, Philippines - Rio de la Cruz, the overall race organizer of the recent National Milo Marathon, owned up to the mistake committed in the 10-kilometer run of the event and apologized for it.

Former Project: Gintong Alay head Michael Keon, who was among the competitors, complained that the race was short in distance by some 1.2 K.

De la Cruz, who has personally apologized to Keon in a series of phone conversations in the weeks following the event, said investigation found out that the 10K runners made their U-turns at the one for the 5K race instead. The turns of the 10K and 5K races stood 600 meters apart.

“There’s always a human error no matter how hard and long the preparation is. In that regard, I personally take full responsibility for what happened. I apologize. I wish to thank Mr. Keon for informing us. This serves as lesson for us for the next races,” he said.

De la Cruz said Keon approached him on race day itself, expressing surprise over his clocking of 45.18 minutes, about five minutes faster than his personal best of 51.11. Keon also said a foreign runner told him his GPS indicated they raced 8.6K only.

“I told him that time that we’ll investigate it. But based on my intuition during that time, I told him most probably ganun ang nangyari (that’s what happened),” said de la Cruz.

He said he regularly gave Keon updates via phone and already said his apologies even if his probe isn’t 100 percent complete yet.

“I told him whatever happens in the investigation, being the overall race director, I take full responsibility for what happened. On behalf of my marshals, my team, the organizers, the sponsors especially Nestle and Milo, I apologize,” de la Cruz recalled in his last conversation with Keon last month.

He said he’ll welcome a meeting or talk with Keon.

“I already apologized to him and wala akong issue kung gusto niya uli akong mag-apologize sa kanya (I have no issues against him if he wants me to apologize again,” he said.

For de la Cruz, this should serve as a learning experience.

Next time, he said, they will make sure everyone involved in the race will be fully briefed.

China has rejected as “unwelcome” the call of the United Kingdom, France and Germany on the South China Sea claimants to respect the arbitration ruling of 2016 and the rules-based framework laid out in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

The Philippines and China effectively consigned to limbo on Thursday the UNCLOS-based arbitral ruling in 2016 on their maritime disputes, and moved to explore instead a wider Code of Conduct for resolving conflicts in the South China Sea.

It would be a betrayal of public trust should the Duterte administration accept China’s rejection of the landmark ruling that invalidated its sweeping claim over the South China Sea, parts of which is the West Philippine Sea, former Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert Del Rosario said Saturday.